I’m not going to reinvent the wheel or give you an idea that will illuminate your path with this post. In fact, I could just end it like this: I used the basics — the old pen, pencil, and paper approach.
But let me tell you why I went this way.
First of all — and maybe the most important thing here — when I decided to create a puzzle game, I put one thing on the table: the small amount of time I had to work on the project. Why does this matter?
Because of my daily schedule, I needed to find extra time to work on the game. And level design felt like the right fit. I thought: “I just need some paper and a pencil, and I can sketch ideas while I wait for my kids during their activities.”
And that’s exactly what I did.
I started taking notes in my car and, whenever I had the chance, I would sketch ideas while waiting.
Was this the best way to work? Probably not.
Did it work for me? I think so. It saved me time and kept me motivated.
In the end, doing 1% of the game every day is much better than doing 0%.
There was also another important advantage. Since I was making a small puzzle game, I could actually playtest the levels on paper. So it wasn’t just about sketching ideas in my spare time — I was also validating them early.
For me, that was a huge win.
I know this is just a small game, but going back to the idea of expectations we talked about before, I wanted to treat it seriously — as if it were a bigger project.
Why?
Because building a routine is one of the main goals of this journey.
But let’s dive deeper into that in the next post.